AuthorTopic: Beatles v Elvis (Read 7627 times)

I personally love Elvis. I think he was fantastic and the most exciting thing when he started it all.It's really hard to me to believe that many people don't like Elvis. I think he was really cool.And it's too sad how he ended his life and how was took as a joke by many people in his later years. It's like Michael Jackson. The man was incredibly successful at least between 1980-1995 but then everyone treated him as a big bastard.

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I don't smoke, I don't drink, I don't eat trash... I work out hard everyday and have a healthy life. And I'm proud of it.

Just by that fact The Beatles are much better than Elvis Presley. I don't care how many #1s or whatever else...is just the fact that Te Beatles went beyond what Elvis did... First, they wrote their own songs....but at the same time they were so creative and willing to experiment different sounds...

Maybe I might be insulted by saying this but sometimes I believe Elvis Presley is SO overrated.... well this is only my opinion....

Maybe I might be insulted by saying this but sometimes I believe Elvis Presley is SO overrated.... well this is only my opinion....

I totally agree, Elvis to me had everything layered out in his career from people, what with hissongs, movies & so on. I think he was fantastic when he first burst on the scene in the 50's, but of course, i wasn't there, so i don't no how it affected people. it must have because John coundn't believe it. All them Sun Records were brilliant in my opinion but then after he joined the army he seemed to lose all that he had in those early days! :-/ He started making those crap movies & all these quite Ridicoulous songs in them. The period that's so overated is the 'White-Suit 70's' period. i mean, for goodness sake!! After all he did in them 50's records and he went to that!! :-/ :-/ I never foget George on the Anthology when he was dissapointed after seeing a show of his in the 70's with girl singers behind him singing 'Oh, i did it my way'!! He was no way creative at all! but i'm sure someone on here will prove me wrong somehow??

I hate when people criticize Elvis without really giving him a chance. I am a HUGE Beatles fan, but Elvis is still one of my favorite artists. In the '50s, the man could not be stopped, he was amazing in his voice, style, and energy. Yes, in the '60s Elvis recorded all of those terrible soundtracks, but he still had some choice material in the '60s. Songs like "Guitar Man", "Big Boss Man", "His Latest Flame" and others were nothing short of wonderful.

And as for the '70s period, people exaggerate way, way, way too much. Too many people think that from 1970-1977 he was some morbidly obese, bumbling, drunk idiot with rhinestone jumpsuits on 24/7. In reality, from 1970-1975 he was still a great performer, with a more matured and incredible voice, backed up by a very talented band (James Burton was a great guitarist, and Ronnie Tutt was probably the best double-bass drummer of the decade). In 1976-1977 is when he started acting weird, but not as much as people say. And so he was fatter than he was in the '60s, so what? Should we hate Paul now because he has a droopy face? Plus, he made some great records at that time, like "Promised Land" and "Way Down". You don't have to like Elvis, just don't base your opinions on talentless impersonators and negative exaggerations.

He was no way creative at all! but i'm sure someone on here will prove me wrong somehow??

But once again you're measuring Elvis by sixties standards, when his heyday was as a fifties act, and it is by those times that his geatness should be calculated. He was in his day as influential and popular as The Beatles were in theirs.To judge him by his 70's career is like judging Paul on the 80's, or John on the 70's.I don't care too much for his music myself, it just bugs me seeing him so readily dismissed.

I figured somewhere on these forums there would have to be a Beatles vs. Elvis thread, if not I would have likely started one myself. One of life's great debates, along with chocolate vs vanilla, Dallas vs Dynasty, Yankees vs Dodgers, Coke vs Pepsi.

Regarding the stats given in the early posts, a couple of things to keep in mind (aside from the fact that they were all UK stats): Elvis's total of over 100 hits (around 150 in the U.S.) is severely misleading. The vast majority of these songs were not hits -- they cracked the top 100 and fizzled out. Out of the (approximately) 150 'hits' Elvis had in the states, only about 40 of them cracked the top 10 (including 17 #1s). That means that less than 30 percent of his releases can be considered true hits! The rest of these songs are really just records that charted, or, if you prefer, flops. Some fluff from one of his '60s movies that got released as a single and made it to #36 on the charts is not a hit. And while the sheer volume of his charted songs is impressive, it doesn't hold a candle to Bing Crosby, who has in the neighborhood of 350! (Why is it that the pre-rock and roll artists are always left out of the statistical comparisons?) How much time Elvis, or any other artist, spent on the charts in any given year is irrelevant, when said artist is flooding the market with recordings, the vast majority of which don't even break the top 10 or 20.

How many more chart hits would the Beatles have racked up had they released a single off Sgt. Pepper or the White Album? The Beatles were the first band whose songs would be played on the radio regardless of whether the song was a single or not. Which is why album-only tracks such as In My Life, Lucy in the Sky, A Day in the Life, Ob-La-Di, Michelle, and dozens of other 'non-hits' have actually become some of their most popular (even if technically they don't fulfill the definition of 'hit').

Compare album performance: the Beatles spent far more time at #1 on the album charts than Presley; They hold the record for most #1 LPs (U.S. stats again) with 19 (Elvis had 9). The Beatles also have a record 6 LPs that have been certified Diamond (10 million copies sold). Led Zeppelin is second with 5. Elvis doesn't have one Diamond LP. The most recent Diamond LP the Beatles achieved was for 1, which came out in 2001. The Anthology series made them one of the biggest selling (if not THE biggest selling) act of the 1990s. Elvis doesn't sell records like that anymore. All the Presley estate revenue comes from tourist trips to Graceland and souvenir sales. Most Elvis fans aren't big record collectors -- besides a couple of greatest hits albums, and maybe a live performance or a gospel LP, that's a pretty thorough Elvis collection right there. A new Beatles fan is likely to start off with a greatest hits album, and once that fan's appetite is whetted, he or she will start to delve deeper into the ocean of discovery that comes with each Beatles record.

The most telling stat, if you want to base this comparison on statistics, is simple: all-time record sales. While worldwide totals are nearly impossible to audit with 100 percent accuracy (and now that the internet is involved, do downloads now count among total sales?), all the official certifications point to the Beatles as being the #1 record sellers. The Elvis camp likes to make the claim that Presley has sold over a billion units but the certifications are inaccurate because of primitive auditing procedures from decades ago (Crosby and Sinatra could probably make the same case, as could the Beatles in fact), but the Beatles were certified at over 1 billion sales in the early '80s. In the U.S., the Beatles have around 180 million certified album sales, according to the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America). Elvis has around 118 million, and he ranks third, behind (gasp, get ready for this) Garth Brooks! Brooks and Elvis seem to go back and forth at the number 2 position; last year Brooks took back second place with a certification of 122 million. That Brooks has sold more albums than Elvis (at least in America, if nowhere else) is a bit of a shocker to me. I can understand Elvis fans' dismay over that stat. (Led Zeppelin is 4th in the U.S. with about 105 million and in fifth is either Elton John, Pink Floyd or the Eagles.)

Elvis was making records for 24 years. The Beatles recorded their much smaller catalogue in 7. That says it all right there.

Well.............to make a long story short.............Elvis "started" it all with R'n'R music, as per see. And Elvis will always be an "icon". The Beatles were influenced by Elvis, seeing that a young guy from nothing could do "something huge".....and the Beatles took that and made it their own. The Beatles........the OTHER rock icon. It's always been Beatles/Elvis, Elvis/Beatles. No two acts in music EVER changed the world as much as these two artists did. Hey, in 1984, I made a perfect A+ in college on a research paper I did on this very subject. Even then people thought I was nuts because I was so into the Beatles.............and by the way..........I liked Elvis "best" during his Las Vegas "lounge-lizard" years...........so cheesy!!!!!

Well............as said before............Elvis never wrote his own material.......the Beatles........."Lennon/McCartney"......later "Harrison".......but, in the long run, BOTH are ICONS!!!! Everyone else, follow behind them.......

elvis was popularized in the media much the wqay brian did the beatles but he did not do the ground work that made rock and roll what it became...who wrote blue suede shoes?not elvis.....the government approved of elvis that is one of the reasons he was popularized....actually i don't want to get into this because i am too passionately against elvis famed position...i will rebute him being the greatest tho after all his last hit was the bathroom floor........